Category: The Post Cellar

I waited to post this because I wanted things to have a chance to settle. I also had to get a feel for my new ride on the windy roads of New Hampshire, a 2007 MazdaSpeed3 in Black Mica.

I bought the ‘Speed3 on the 5th of November. My first new car, or should I say, the newest car I’ve ever bought. Out the door from Ira Toyota in Manchester for $15k with 25k miles. The best deal for such a car within 250 miles.

Pros

Turbo, performance and handling is excellent.
Great seats.
Aux-in for an MP3 player.
Familiar feel, being Japanese and FWD.
Slick looks, hatches rule!
Practical.
Good on gas despite using premium fuel (near 30MPG if I stay off the go-pedal)

Cons

Interior ergonomics, featuring wasted real estate and cheap-feel controls and knobs.
See “Stupid HVAC controls” below regarding the fan and temperature knobs.

Stupid HVAC controls.
There are a couple of very narrow knobs, one for fan speed and the other for temperature. Right off the bat, I’m not a fan of actual temperature readouts in cars. Give me a blue-to-red gradient and call it a day. Regardless, the knobs are difficult to grip. You can’t turn off the fan and just use the defrost vent to bring in fresh air from the outside. You also can’t disable the A/C being on (via an “econ” mode or something similar) when using the defrost vents. So either the air is coming through the dash or floor vents when the fan is off. When you switch to defrost mode, the fan speed kicks up to the maximum. Put it all together and it’s an annoying system to use.

Annoying gauge dimmer behavior.
Like most cars, there is a little rheostat that lets me dim or brighten the illumination of the instrumentation. There is also a button that “maxes out” the illumination in that it sets the brightness at the highest level whether the headlights are on or off. This is great for cloudy, dark days or at dusk because it lets me have my parking lights or full headlights on and still be able to see the gauges. The problem is at night, when it’s too bright. I’m constantly finding myself adjusting the setting depending on the time of day or weather.

No factory boost gauge (and plenty of room in the cluster for that and more!)

So what to replace my old trusty beater with? There are more choices now than ever before in the history of the automobile. Korean, Japanese, German, American… there is something for everyone. When I first started out, I completely fooled myself into thinking what would be practical. Used BMW M3s, Audi S4s, Cadillac CTS-Vs- these cars were doable in the upper-20k and lower 30k range. Thanks to being weighed down by a big mortgage and house-related bills, I don’t have tens of thousands lying around for either an all-out purchase or hefty down payment. At the same time, I don’t want to spend every penny I earn and live paycheck to paycheck, either. Those days are well behind me. I’ve learned my lesson.

This process has been another lesson, in what you should do vs. what you can do. Sure, I can afford a $500-700 a month car payment. Should I? Of course not! Once the math was done, with a trivial down payment those cars I listed above become massive monthly obligations. That just isn’t smart.

So I began to look around with modified expectations in mind. The following list is what I ultimately came up with:

• Year-round practicality
• 4 door
• Manual transmission
• Not FWD
• Not 4 cylinder (if it is, needs a turbo)
• 20+ highway MPG
• Can be tracked occasionally (overall performance makes it worthy)
• Positive reviews from press and enthusiasts alike
• 2006+ model
• Sticker of $20k or less

What fit this like a glove? The Subaru Legacy GT. A great looking grown-up car that is comfortable, fun, and highly rated. For the last several months, I have been scouring the car classifieds. I came across models here and there, but there was always something nipping at my mind. I just couldn’t bring myself to pull the trigger on anything. In the end, it all came down to car payments. I simply wasn’t willing to kiss $500 a month with a 4 or 5 year note. Financing $20k at 7% (the average going rate for a used car loan) over 4 years is around $480 a month. Sorry, but I just can’t bring myself to pay that kind of money for a car. When I first took over the payments for my 2000 Sentra, I was paying $328 a month. To me, around $300 is reasonable.

So I adjusted my expectations a little further. What could I get for $5k down the food chain that would make me happy? Now you’re talking about higher miles and older models. By moving the price limit to the $15k neighborhood, the math finally started to make a bit more sense. If I can get $2000 for my Sentra on the open market, financing a total of $13k over 4 years means payments of about $300 a month. So I find a car stickered in the $15k range, talk the price down closer to $14k, throw $2k down on top of that and then you’re talking $275 a month! Very reasonable. A Legacy in this range has higher miles. For example, ’05 or ’06 models, out of warranty, are averaging about 60-70k miles.

Enter the Mazdaspeed3. A car that stickered new for $10k less than a comparable Legacy GT. A very different car to be sure, but certainly a huge step up from what I have now. My above listed criteria are met by the ‘Speed3 in every regard other than the fact that it’s FWD. It’s fast, has gotten excellent reviews, and is based on a platform that I have a little experience with. Back in February, I spent time driving around in a base model 3 sedan. I thought it was a pretty nice car. The handling and performance was nothing special, but it felt solid to me. It made a good impression on me. With fun behind the wheel in mind, a ‘Speed3 makes a lot of sense. Take the car that I enjoyed driving back in February, give it a turbo and performance-oriented tweaks like a better suspension- now you’re talking!

I pulled my most recent credit report today and it’s higher than its ever been in my whole life. Past mistakes are finally gone! With that behind me, I can look forward. Tonight I’ll be taking the ‘Speed3 for a spin. If I like what I feel and they’re willing to deal, I may just have my first new car, ever.

I’ve been driving a 2000 Nissan Sentra SE since 2004. Previous to that, I drove a 1991 Nissan Sentra SE-R. Previous to that I drove a 1991 Nissan Sentra SE-R. Previous to that I didn’t have a driver’s license. So as you can see, I have a lot of experience driving slow econoboxen. I have very little experience behind the wheel of other cars. In fact, I could probably list them here fairly easily. I’m not going to, because that’s not what this entry is about.

Last fall, after failing the state inspection twice, I started to poke around looking for “new to me” cars. At the time, winter was rolling in and there wasn’t really anything wrong with my car other than its inability to pass emissions, thanks to the aftermarket header that I installed in the Spring. Also affecting my ability to pass was a persistent check engine light that I’ve had for a few years. I was able to pass earlier inspections by clearing the code, but not this time.

So my 2000 Sentra is technically illegal- for more than a year and counting.

This isn’t why I’m looking at new cars, though. On top of the inspection issue, I have some long-neglected issues that I have ignored for a while. The air conditioning doesn’t work and it likely needs a new compressor. The rear brakes are pretty much shot and have a rotational noise that comes on during braking. It needs new calipers/rotors/pads back there. The fronts are still in decent shape, but they haven’t been touched in a couple of years.

Oh, but I could just drop $500 and a weekend of my time to take care of all these, right? Maybe, in a best-case scenario, but I have to face the fact that I don’t want to. I’m sick of my car. It’s slow. It’s loud, thanks to a noisy riceboy aftermarket exhaust that I had to put on to replace the rusted-out stock one. I have to track down a stock header and replace what I have on there to pass emissions. I have to figure out once and for all what is causing the check engine light, and fix it. There is some troubleshooting involved with both this and the air conditioning. I suspect the compressor is bad, but again, I have to troubleshoot it in earnest to know for sure.

I’m about to hit 130,000 miles. What will be the next big thing to need repair? I now realize the key to keeping cars well into their six-figure mileage is to stay on top of the little things. I should’ve fixed the AC in 2007 when it started to show signs of trouble. I should’ve knocked down the evap system issue that caused the check engine light when it first came on. (Not for lack of trying, I replaced a few things in that system last year but it didn’t solve the problem.) I don’t mind working on my cars. I love the cost savings, and knowing what you did is actually the correct thing. However, I’m flat-out tired of my car. It’s not fun to drive. It struggles to pass anything on the road. It’s loud, boring, and I want a new one.

It has always treated me well, though. It has never left me stranded and it hasn’t needed much in the way of repairs. Just wear and tear kinds of things which you get with every car. It’s paid for and it gets good gas mileage on cheap gas. I haven’t totally neglected it, although lately I feel like I have been. I’m a few thousand miles over the 3k oil change interval and I need to rotate the tires. Otherwise, it has decent tires and the alignment is good.

At the end of the day, the B15 will be getting replaced- and soon. I will clean it up a bit and post it for sale on Craigslist. In fair condition it is worth about $2700. I will try and get at least $2000 for it and wave my final goodbye to Nissan ownership, for now.

Now that I’ve finished de-labeling (shame on you Mayflower Brewing for making your labels so hard to remove) and sanitizing my 12oz bottles, I’m getting ready to put the raspberry and Thai sweet basil tripel experiment to bed. More than a month ago I racked off my tripel into a couple of Martha’s Exchange growlers. One with some fresh frozen local raspberries and the other with Thai sweet basil from my garden. The former was inspired by “just for the hell of it” with the latter inspired by the excellent Bruery Trade Winds tripel.

Everything went without a hitch. Every batch I bottle or keg, I realize what brewing toys I’d like to have to upgrade the whole experience. All the pouring and gravity-feeding of things… I’ll report back in a couple of weeks how these experiments turned out.

While I’m juggling this, neighborhood families are ringing my doorbell. Earlier in the day, I dropped $20 on last-minute big bags of candy at Hannaford. I feel an obligation to hand out candy when I’m home on the 31st. A year ago, I was in Cambridge with friends at the Cambridge Brewing Company’s Pumpkin Beer Fest. It was the night before my wedding. Tomorrow is my first anniversary. So back to this Halloween obligation… I feel obligated to hand out candy when I’m home. It’s just one of those “neighborhoody” things to do and we live in a “normal” neighborhood with regards to trick-or-treat. It started out slow. Not a lot of foot traffic out in the street at 6:00 when things officially started. By about 6:30 or so, there were a lot of people outside. “Flip on the post and porch lights and they will come,” as the saying goes, right?

Wasn’t as steady as previous years, but it seemed busy overall. When all is said and done, we have a big bowl of candy left over. Now to resist eating it…

I finally have the brewing area cleaned out. I will need to patch the hole in the floor and I want to treat/cover the foundation with something. I’m not going to go so far as to trowel on mortar, but I will at least spray it a nice bright white color.  The concrete floor is in good enough shape that a little sweeping will be all it needs for prep. I am scouring Craigslist for a stainless counter, maybe something from a restaurant. I need a solid, flat, easy to clean surface which sit next to the sink.

This was a brief update, but progress is being made. The junk I cleaned out last week was picked up by a couple of guys in a beat up truck earlier tonight.

Every year, the Portsmouth Brewery releases Kate the Great. It’s a Russian Imperial Stout that people line up around the block to get. Hardly 2 years ago when this beer was released you could walk in and get a growler filled or buy a few bottles from the cooler in the brewpub’s store. No lines, no hassles, no hype machine leading up to the release day. All it took were a few gushing reviews and the beer nerd community ran with it. Now you have lines, mob scenes, and of course the nitwits that only care about getting the latest release up on eBay. (Insert whiny pro-capitalist rebuttal here.) Just because you can do something, doesn’t mean you should. But I digress. I’ll rant about greedy beer tickers another day.

Yesterday, Allagash Brewing up in Portland released the second beer in a limited series. The first release, “Gargamel,” was back in May and I wasn’t able to get there for it. There was a bit of drama surrounding my attempts to secure some from afar but needless to say, I didn’t get any. This really bummed me out for the simple reason that I knew what I was missing. In most cases, the people buying this stuff have never had it before. They are going on hype and reputation. Breweries like Allagash aren’t exactly plastering ads in national magazines for this stuff. Maybe a little blurb on their website, a few articles in beer-centric blogs, and the all-powerful hype machines also known as the BeerAdvocate and RateBeer forums. This how most people get their interest piqued before a beer release.

Since Allagash is “local” beer for me, I was fortunate to be able to sample Gargamel at a beer festival earlier this year. It was amazing. I had seconds and thirds. When asked if it would ever be available in bottles they told me it would be released “in a few months in limited quantities at the brewery only.” Other life commitments didn’t allow me to make that first release day, but for this latest release, I planned ahead. Went up Sunday, spent some time at The Great Lost Bear and Novare Res and on Monday morning, I headed over to Allagash.

I didn’t even get there when they opened. I strolled in, bought my bottles, and left. No crowds, no lines, no problems. However, I am not sure this will last. The first release was still available for sale after a few days. This second release, known as “Vagabond,” sold out by lunchtime. If memory serves, there were 800 bottles of Gargamel up for sale to Vagabond’s 500 bottles.

So why do I say “hype light?” Because it seems like each release is getting more publicity. The insanity that a Kate the Great Day ushers in hasn’t arrived here yet. I am going to bet at the next release there will be more people and it will sell out sooner. Crowds and craziness will ensue. Luckily for me, I can easily get to and stay in Portland and have flexibility with my job. Getting to these events (when I really want to) should not be a problem. I’m just not sure I want to deal with the congestion that accompanies these popular releases. Perhaps I just need to suck up and deal, but in the meantime, I will enjoy what I can get on my terms.

Actually, I should just brew this kind of stuff and ignore all the hype and crowds…